EDT 2004 : an open interactive timetabling tool

This article deals with the analysis and design of an interactive decision support system for timetable management. This tool will be able to take hierarchical data organization into account and to maintain coherence of the constraints on this data. Our research which has led to the creation of the EDT tool has two aims. The first aim is to provide an open, generic tool which can be developed in many different ways. In order to achieve this aim, we have followed an object-oriented approach and we have defined object classes dedicated for the modeling of the timetabling problem. The second aim is to analyze the needs in timetable manipulation and to provide a generic organization so that the tool can be used in many situations. To achieve this aim, both user based and automated technics are used. keywords: generic timetables model, interactive timetabling, multi points of view, decision support tool